When I was 8 we met my mother's Aunt Frances for brunch at a French restaurant. Aunt Frances was a very distinguished woman who never seemed to age in all of her 90-something years. She would offer you a cocktail upon entering her Upper East Side apartment (even if it was barely 11 am) and she wore her black hair in a chignon until the end. I still remember that brunch-- eating a hot baguette spread with butter and strawberry jam with my chin barely above the crumb covered white tablecloth. It tasted like magic-- and somehow this simple combination of flavors and textures continues to taste like magic even now.

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